The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has appointed 1,500 new employees to oversee voter registration for their parliamentary elections in September. Another 50,000 will be brought on under contract as well by the Kurdish electoral commission. When Iraq held its may parliamentary elections, widespread accusations of fraudulent voting practices were echoed throughout Kurdistan by several political parties. Now, the KRG is attempting to prevent a repeat of those events.

Electoral commission member Jurtiar Adil told local media that,

Updating the voter registration has turned into a sensitive subject. We have suggested that parties themselves choose the people they want to update the registration within the conditions and standards set by the commission. These people have now been recruited and will start their work in the coming days. The salary for the manager of a center is 600,000 dinars (roughly $500), his deputy 550,000 (roughly $462), and employees 500,000 (roughly $420) dinars per month.”

During the registration process, the newly assembled team will work for three or four months. Previously, efforts were being made to modify the old registration forms but it was eventually decided that new ones would be created based off existing food ration forms. Kurdistan‘s Regional High Independent Referendum and Electoral Commission director of data Karwan Jalal made this known in June. He told reporters that, “Instead of cleaning the voter registration, which would take a long time, the commission has prepared a new voter registration for the upcoming elections of Kurdistan.”